Chapter 21
If it wasn't for the questions that remained unanswered, Jack wouldn't have let Ianto out of bed the following morning. Overnight, the younger man had started to snuffle in his sleep and had even managed to wake himself up with a loud sneeze. Despite protestations from Jack that he'd caught a cold sitting out in the rain, Ianto insisted he was fine and that there was no way he was going to let Jack go into work without him.
"Remember the conversation about me being a grown-up?" Ianto fixed Jack with a stare as he reached past him to grab hold of the box of tissues. "Well, this is me being old enough to know that Owen won't be writing me a sick note for a couple of sneezes and a bit of a runny nose."
"But Ianto…" Jack started to object until he thought better of it. "OK, I get the message. If I treat you like a five year old, you'll scream if I as much as look at you."
"Yep – that about sums it up." Ianto threw the used tissues into a waste bin and frowned as he took a good look at Jack. "Come on let's get to the Hub so you can get into your own clothes. You just look wrong in a hoodie and as for those jeans, they look positively obscene. They're not the ones I left out for you."
"Hey – those baggy ones just hung off my ass. Not a good look."
"You are such a vain bastard."
Ianto helped Jack into his greatcoat, hoping that it would cover up the jeans that clung to every curve and bulge as if they'd been painted on.
"Looked in a mirror recently?" Jack raised his eyebrows at Ianto indignantly. "Oh yes, make that about twenty times to straighten your tie, check the buttons on your waistcoat are shining and that there isn't a single fibre of lint on your jacket!"
"Standards, Jack – I have standards. It's not the same as being vain." Ianto grabbed hold of Jack's shoulder firmly, as he took a stiff bristled clothes brush to the worst of the dried dirt on the coat he admired so much.
Snatching the car keys from the shelf next to the coat rack, Ianto opened the door without further ado and made straight for the SUV. By the time Jack had chance to react, Ianto was already shutting the driver's door and adjusting the rear view mirror. Chuckling to himself, Jack shut the front door behind him and jogged to the SUV, not altogether trusting Ianto to wait for him before driving off.
"Anything, Tosh?" Owen whispered furtively as Tosh scanned through the files of recordings from Jack's office overnight.
"Nothing – absolutely nothing. Maybe Ianto is onto me and wiped the lot. Damn – I can't find a single trace of either of them having been here all night." Tosh looked disgruntled as took off her glasses and set them on the desk next to the keyboard. She'd had a bet on with Owen that could only be settled by viewing the argument that they were convinced had taken place between Jack and Ianto.
"No luck there then?" asked Gwen from the balcony overlooking the work stations.
"Zilch. What about you? Heard anything from either of them yet?" Tosh looked up at Gwen, pointing at the mobile she was clasping in her hand.
"Not a peep." Gwen clattered down the metal stairs to join Tosh. "What bothers me is that if Jack never came back here, and neither did Ianto, that suggests that Jack stayed over at his house last night. I really thought Ianto would hold out for longer."
"Maybe he gave Jack what for back at his place?" suggested Tosh hopefully.
"More like the other way round," muttered Owen.
"Piss off, Owen – you didn't see the state Ianto was in last night." Gwen thumped Owen on the arm, feeling the need to defend Ianto. "I've never known him that angry with Jack before."
"I'm telling you – I bet he succumbed to the Harkness charm. Either that or the overbearing, pompous –"
"Shhh! It's them!" hissed Tosh, alerted by the lights that started to flash as the cog wheel door slowly turned to open.
Ianto led the way, immaculately turned out, his head held high. A slight smile graced his lips as he placed the SUV keys on his own desk. Gwen looked over at Tosh and grinned – that simple gesture told them exactly who had the upper hand on that particular morning. Owen just shook his head and grimaced as he took in the fact that Jack was evidently dressed in Ianto's clothes under his own far from pristine great coat.
"Good morning. Who's for coffee?" Ianto asked.
"That would be wonderful, Ianto." Tosh smiled with gratitude, there was nothing quite like freshly brewed coffee to wake up her synapses first thing in the morning. "Are you feeling alright?"
"Yes, thank you, Tosh," Ianto glared at Jack, preventing him from blurting out anything about a cold. "Much better and I have Owen to thank for that – I'd give him a great big soppy kiss, but I don't think he'd appreciate it."
"You're welcome coffee boy, but I'll pass on the snog for now, wouldn't want to get Jack jealous," Owen turned his attention to Jack quickly, spotting the opportunity to ask what had happened. "So what about you, boss – rough night weevil hunting?"
"Like you wouldn't believe," Jack muttered, stealing a quick glance at Ianto, who was just slowly shaking his head from side to side.
"Perhaps you'd like to change into something more suitable for work, sir and I'll prepare some coffee and take it to the boardroom?"
"Sure – briefing in fifteen minutes people – Tosh and Owen bring your findings." Jack gratefully accepted the prompt from Ianto."Oh yes… Gwen?"
"Jack?" Gwen gave Jack a quizzical look.
"Bring everything you've got on our investigation into the police situation."
"What? Can you clarify that … surely you don't mean…?" Gwen looked gobsmacked – perhaps the blows to his skull had managed to inflict permanent damage after all.
"Yes, I do mean that. The project I had you working on. It's about time to get everyone on board with that problem."
Jack winked conspiratorially at Ianto, which rather undermined the whole point of being more open with his team, but they were too taken aback by their leader's apparent personality change to notice Ianto roll his eyes in mock despair.
As soon as Jack had rushed off in the direction of his office, they all focused their attention back on Ianto.
"OK, Jones, what the fuck have you done with the real Jack Harkness?" Owen demanded. "Not that I'm complaining. I could grow to like this version you found."
"What would you say if I said I dumped him in the Bay with bricks in his pockets?"
"I'd say you'd been watching too much Dexter. Then I'd go check your stock of black bin bags."
"Ianto – what the hell did you say to him?" Gwen was in awe. She'd been trying for weeks to get Jack to share his suspicions with the others. Her wheedling and pouting had got her nowhere. There was a resolve behind Ianto's mild mannered façade that she couldn't help but admire.
"Not much – just a few home truths." Ianto had sought refuge in the comforts of the shining coffee machine and was busying himself grinding the beans in preparation for the first brew of the day.
"Not much?" Tosh was scrutinising Ianto over the top of her glasses that had she had propped coquettishly on the end of her nose. "Sounds to me like Jack is getting ready to spill the beans on one of his secret projects. Willingly. Have you been sneaking a look at my manual of evil persuasion techniques?"
Ianto shuddered briefly before carefully collecting the aromatic coffee grounds from the grinder.
"I am not worthy to be inducted into your league of evil interrogators, Miss Sato." Smiling at Tosh in the reflection on the coffee machine, Ianto shrugged slightly. "Perhaps I just managed to appeal to the side of Jack that really wants to take us all into his confidence."
"Bollocks, that doesn't exist! Trust me, I'm a doctor, I'd have found it by now if it did." Owen grunted in disbelief.
"I beg to differ, Owen, it's there – you just need to know where to look." Ianto winked at Owen before tucking his head down as he carefully arranged cups and saucers on a tray along with a small jug of milk and a plate of biscuits.
"Well there you go then." Owen stated disparagingly. "Not all of us are prepared to go those lengths to get through to the boss."
"Then it's just as well I am – isn't it?"
"Come on, Owen, you can help me pull together our report." Tosh tugged at Owen's arm, having been prompted by Gwen to give her some time alone with Ianto. On her way towards the autopsy bay, Tosh turned to Gwen and mouthed the word 'later'.
As soon as Tosh and Owen walked off to collect their data and findings from their respective desk tops, Gwen turned to Ianto and put her hand flat on his chest, stopping him in his tracks.
"Ianto, I take it you managed to talk to him – did he listen?"
Ianto sighed and gently bit on his lower lip before turning to Gwen and softly confiding in her.
"For now – but you know Jack. He'll have forgotten his promises by the end of the week, or convinced himself that he knows what's best for us all."
"What do you mean by that?"
"He means well, but… I think half the time he's afraid of getting too close to any of us, because eventually he'll lose us and the rest of the time he's terrified that if he keeps us at too much of a distance he'll lose his humanity. All I can do is try to steer him on an even course that will get him through the next few hours, days… however long I have…"
"And you're OK with that?" Gwen's fingertips gently brushed over Ianto's tie, pausing above his heart. "Seems a bit one sided to me. What about what you need?"
"It's all I have now, Gwen and to be honest, all I want."
Tosh and Owen sat at the head of the table together, ready to deliver their report on what they'd discovered as a result of their research to date. They looked across at Jack as he walked in and went over to Gwen, hand held out to take a thick file of paperwork from her. Owen assumed that must be her 'special project' as Jack relied on old fashioned paperwork when he wanted to keep secrets. Meanwhile, Ianto quietly moved around the table, distributing cups of coffee as he took satisfaction in watching the team start to work together properly once more.
"You first." Jack took a seat next to Ianto and prompted Owen to make a start. "Looks like you and Tosh have been working hard on all of this. What've you got for us?"
Owen screwed up his face, wondering for the second time, what kind of Faustian deal Ianto Jones had made to get Jack Harkness to sit down and listen to his team. He was pretty sure that he'd already sold his soul a while back, which left his body. Owen idly wondered if Ianto had asked for a receipt.
"Right then, so here's the big breakthrough that Tosh and I figured out last night, when we were still here working after the rest of you had abandonned us. The hospital pathologists concentrated on blood samples – that's what they sent off for analysis – all they show are the antibodies and by deduction, the nature of the antigens that triggered the adverse reactions. The same antibodies we found in Ianto's blood."
Owen paused as if to acknowledge the fact that yet again Ianto had narrowly escaped death. Looking across to where Ianto sat he could see that Jack had reached out to rest his hand on the younger man's shoulder, a gesture that actually made him smile.
"Anyway, when Jack and I visited the victims in hospital, I took sputum samples as well and they've helped us to go a stage further. I was looking for airborne particles of some sort … residue from some artefact that fell through the Rift maybe, but what we found is both better and worse."
"What is it?" Jack frowned, it was his prerogative to be enigmatic, not Owen's.
"Pollen." Tosh announced proudly.
"What?" Gwen looked confused.
"Look at this-" Tosh projected an image onto the display screen on the end wall.
She zoomed in from a low magnification to a much higher one to show the tetrahedral shapes in sharper focus, their facets displaying intricate patterns of dimples and tiny spines. On the points were small swollen areas that softened the shape.
"I thought pollen was all spiky when magnified." Gwen peered at the images, surprised by how delicate the designs were.
"That's only in insect pollinated flowers," explained Tosh. "The smoother pollen is the sort you normally get with wind pollinated varieties, like tree and grass pollens that trigger asthma attacks and hay fever."
"So it's just a case of really bad hay fever." Ianto frowned, absently pulling a handkerchief from his pocket to blow his nose. Catching the concerned look from Jack he mumbled quietly: "It's just a snuffly nose, that's all."
"No. I had Kew check this against their data base and they've got nothing like it– nothing even close."
"New species?" Gwen asked naively.
"Oh God – please don't tell me it's an alien plant." Ianto had images of Triffids invading the streets of Cardiff.
"Yes. Well that's what we think. It's either that or a more highly evolved Earth species from the future that has slipped back in time through the Rift." Tosh explained carefully. "The thing is that it's not meant to be here and its pollen triggered the dangerous reactions in those people."
"What about Ianto then?" Jack interjected. "He cut his hand on something - that couldn't have been pollen."
"Another part of the plant – if there's pollen, there's a full plant somewhere, out there and part of it must have been blown onto the SUV in the wind." Owen replied. "Then Ianto managed to cut himself on it and then suck his thumb – bloody idiot- and that's what triggered his anaphylactic reaction."
"So – it's not necessarily malicious – not a triffid then." Ianto appeared disconcerted. "Although I quite like the idea of triffids taking out that big bastard at the club. Oh shit, I need to get onto that today – Tosh I need your help with something-"
"Secret project, Ianto?" asked Jack feigning innocent inquiry.
Gwen gave Ianto a wide-eyed stare, recalling how he'd twisted the thug's bleeding arm behind his back.
"OK – maybe I happened to threaten a large gentleman who was about to completely cave your skull in." Ianto almost looked embarrassed at admitting to Jack that he'd become violent with someone purely because they were hurting him. "I might have told him that if he wasn't out of Cardiff by this afternoon I was going to set him up - "
"Ianto!" Gwen gasped in astonishment – no wonder Ianto had made sure she couldn't hear what he'd been saying.
"Nice one, mate." Owen was impressed.
"Sooo ... Tosh?" Ianto raised his eyebrows hopefully.
"Make me a macchiato, one of the special ones, and by the time you've put the milk on top I'll have it done." Tosh graced Ianto with a secretive smile that made it clear that it wasn't the first time the two of them had made such a bargain.
"You're on."
Owen coughed loudly to draw attention back to the satellite image he'd projected onto the screen.
"When you two have finished plotting the downfall of a deserving villain, let's get back to the alien plant. Having plotted the movements of our victims, I've come to the conclusion that our plant has to be somewhere in Albany Road. Which means we need to start looking there for strange looking plant life."
"What? Albany Road? Again? You've got to be kidding me!" Ianto rolled his eyes in disbelief.